Voice of Flowers/Alpine Flowers
ALPINE FLOWERS.
Meek dwellers 'mid yon terror-stricken cliffs,
With brows so pure, and incense-breathing lips,
Whence are ye?
Did some white-wing'd messenger,
On Mercy's errands, trust your timid germ
To the cold cradle of eternal snows?
Or, breathing on the callous icicles,
Bid them, with tear-drops, nurse ye?
Tree, nor shrub
Dare yon drear atmosphere. No polar pine
Uprears a veteran front. Yet there ye stand.
Leaning your cheeks against the thick-ribb'd ice,
And looking up, with trustful eyes, to Him
Who bids you bloom, unblanch'd, amid the waste
Of desolation.
Man, who panting toils
O'er slippery steeps; or, trembling, treads the verge
Of yawning gulfs, from which the headlong plunge
Is to eternity, looks shuddering up,
And marks ye in your placid loveliness,
Fearless, yet frail; and, clasping his chill hands,
Blesses your pencil'd beauty. Mid the pomp
Of mountain-summits, towering to the skies,
And chaining the rapt soul in breathless awe,
He bows to bind you drooping to his breast,
Inhales your fragrance on the frost-wing'd gale,
And freer dreams of Heaven.